In the last few years, the words “Edmonton Oilers” and “Power Play” have been synonymous with each other.
Since 2019–20, the Oilers lead the league with a power play percentage of 28.5%, 3.6% more than the second place Tampa Bay Lightning. This includes the best regular season power play in NHL history in 2022–23, scoring on a whopping 32.4% of power play chances. In fact, in these past five seasons, the Oilers have had the first, fifth, and 16th best power play seasons in NHL history.
That success has also applied in the playoffs, where the Oilers lead the league with a 32.7% power play percentage over those five seasons, peaking at 46.2% last post season.
Oilers power play so far his playoff
The power play was red hot once again to start these playoffs, with the Oilers going 9/20 (45%) in their first round matchup against the Los Angeles Kings.
The power play cooled a bit in the second round, where the Oilers went 6/20 (30%). The Oilers cooled down as the series went on, however, only scoring one goal on their final 10 chances in games 5, 6, and 7.
So far into the Western Conference Finals, the Oilers have scored zero power play goals on five chances. Granted, that is still technically second best of the remaining teams, as both Dallas and New York have been scoreless on more chances. Only Florida has had any success, converting on 3 of their 11 chances.
Much hullabaloo has been made about recent comments made by Oilers Head Coach Kris Knoblauch regarding the standard of officiating. The comments have been blown out of proportion, at least in my opinion, as the caption of the tweet merely states “We would like the same standard,” making it appear as those Knoblauch was complaining about unfair treatment by the officials. If you actually listen to the interview (a high standard these days, I know), it is clear he is merely stating that the standard of what is considered a penalty changes in the playoffs, and explicitly says he thinks its been fair to both teams.
But when the team’s power play isn’t succeeding, is there really much of a benefit to more power plays anyway? Well, of course there is, if only because then you have two minutes that are spent mostly in the offensive zone (at least hopefully). But just draining time isn’t much of a winning strategy, especially for a team where adding a lethal power play to their increased 5v5 production could make an almost unstoppable offensive juggernaut.
So what is happening with the Oilers mighty power play lately? Is Dallas just that good on the penalty kill? Have they finally found a way to shut down the Oilers one specifically? Or is it the Oilers who are shooting themselves in the foot and not executing properly? Is it both? Did the Monstars from Space Jam decide to make a hockey version sequel and sucked out the Oilers power?
The Oilers power play strategies
Before going into what’s wrong in this series, let’s look at what’s been right in the past.
One of the reasons the Oilers are so dominant on the power play is that they have a wide variety of plays that they use. The other reason is that the players on the ice are all so creative and work so well together that they are also able to improvise on the fly as well.
The Draisaitl one-timer
When people think about the Oilers power play, the first thought is the patented Leon Draisaitl sharp angle one-timer:
It is in league with the Alex Ovechkin and Steve Stamkos PP one-timers, where everyone knows it is coming and yet somehow they are unable to stop it.
One of the reasons why is due to the movement of the Oilers leading up to it. In the above clip, Draisaitl has the puck on the side boards. After dishing it off to McDavid coming out of the corner, Draisaitl doesn’t go to his “spot” right away, but instead skates towards the net, acting as a screen for McDavid.
Everyone is puck watching McDavid because, well, it’s McDavid, and Draisaitl quietly floats into the corner spot. Vladislav Gavrikov follows McDavid instead of Draisaitl, while the other Kings players are guarding Evan Bouchard on the other point, Zach Hyman in front of the net and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins at the backdoor.
McDavid passes it to Bouchard, shifting the entire L.A. PK formation towards him. However, the quick pass back to McDavid, who changes his direction upon receipt, gets the PK trying to quickly rotate back. But, since Gavrikov was following McDavid up, when the play gets reversed he is too high up to get to Draisaitl down low.
This lapse appears to be on Gavrikov, who chases up to McDavid at the same time that Anze Kopitar does. Because McDavid is such a dangerous player one-on-one, opposing players are worried giving him too much space. Also, despite him doing it hundreds of times, there is probably the thought process that Draisaitl is not actually in the most dangerous position here, as you have the net presences of Hyman, the open one-timer of Bouchard, and the back-door pass to Nugent-Hopkins. In all honesty, that probably is the right decision, as those other plays do have a higher chance of going in than a wide angle shot, but because Draisaitl is so good it is a much more legitimate scoring chance than it would be for most players.
The Hyman backdoor
Hyman scored 54 regular season goals this year. 15 of those were on the power play. The average distance from the net? 8.3 feet, and a vast majority of them look like the above clip.
The Oilers lose the draw, but Hyman manages to recover and send it back around to Draisatl to allow the Oilers to set up. The Oilers immediately pass the puck around the perimeter, and once it gets to McDavid he cooly slides it back door to Hyman for an easy tap in.
How is Hyman that wide open? Again, it comes down to player movement. When Draisaitl gets the puck, he dishes to Bouchard who is on the left point. Bouchard immediately starts moving towards the centre of the ice. You can see at this point that McDavid has floated wide, while Hyman isn’t even in the frame. Two Kings are in the shooting lane despite no one in front.
Instead, like Draisaitl on the first goal above, Hyman just quietly gets to his spot after he passes the puck off.
When McDavid receives the pass, he has gone from a point spot to the top of the circle, and not a single Oiler is within the L.A. box. Because of that, he appears to be the only scoring threat, and so two Kings push towards him as he looks to shoot.
However, he is not shooting and instead passes to Hyman, who no one noticed until it is too late.
Bouch Bomb
The weapon that Oilers fans have been begging for arrived following the trade of Tyson Barrie, handing the power play point position to Evan “Bouch Bomb” Bouchard.
This added another play to the arsenal, as Bouchard’s shot is one of the best in the league, as demonstrated by him hammering 112 shots above 90 mph this season.
This is a fairly standard PP play to move around to open up a one-timer from the point. The beauty of this play is that the Oilers have two serious one-timer threats with different handedness in Bouchard and Draisaitl. Initially McDavid is between the two, although the way the players were set neither was an option for a one timer.
McDavid cuts around, opening up the Draisaitl one timer. The Kings are able to over commit as Bouchard is not on his one time side and so not an immediate threat.
But Draisaitl doesn’t shoot, instead he quickly taps it back to Bouchard, who floated into the middle of the ice when all eyes were on McDavid. Bouchard has plenty of space to uncork his bomb, and the Oilers take the lead.
Organized chaos
The last strategy both is and is not necessarily a set play. As mentioned above, the Oilers thrive off of unpredictability that is predicated on the skill of the players on the ice being able to quickly read and adapt to the situation. It’s the reason why the power play can look to be stumbling and absolutely awful, and then suddenly pick apart a PK like it wouldn’t even matter if it was there.
A good example is the Oilers first power play goal in the Vancouver series:
The Canucks looked to have the Oilers number, as the Oilers couldn’t muster a shot and were sent out of the zone. It looked like the Canucks had found a way to negate the Oilers.
The Oilers didn’t get their first shot on the PP until 1:10 into it, off an individual rush by Draisaitl. Bouchard managed to maintain the zone, allowing the Oilers to set up.
Let’s take a look at each player on this play after that.
Draisaitl starts on the high left side boards, sends a pass across the ice and then after a beat comes down through the middle of the ice to the bottom right corner. He receives a pass and slowly works his way up to the top of the circle, passing it back down to Nugent-Hopkins who is now in the corner, and then skates towards the net as a potential option for a pass and shot.
After the recovery by Bouchard, McDavid skates to the far side boards and receives the pass from Draisaitl at the faceoff dot. He waits as both Draisaitl and Nugent-Hopkins skate through the box, and passes down to Nugent-Hopkins. Seeing Draisaitl stop up a bit in front of the net to engage the Canuck defender, her backs back up to his spot, gets the return from Nugent-Hopkins, and skates back to the point to open up the Canucks box. He passes back down to Draisaitl and drifts to the opposite boards. He ends up pulling the Canucks player towards him for a bit, which allows Draisaitl to skate further into the centre.
Bouchard goes from the left point to the right point, then shifts back to the left point to open up as a one-time option for McDavid. As the puck goes back down to Draisaitl and McDavid starts veering towards the centre of the ice, Bouchard moves back towards the centre to allow an outlet for Draisaitl, and then continues to the right point once Nugent-Hopkins has the puck down low.
Nugent-Hopkins starts in the middle of the ice and then cuts through the slot into the bottom right corner. He then gets the pass down low from McDavid, and with no options opening up passes it back and immediately cuts to the front of the net, which allows the pass down to Draisaitl as mentioned above. Nugent-Hopkins engages the defenceman in front (notably taking attention away from Hyman behind him), and then releases back into the corner, where after getting the pass he has all the time in the world given he has two back door options that the Canucks are trying to cut off. Granted, you can say that getting the pass across was lucky, but good to be lucky and lucky to be good right?
Finally, goal scorer Hyman starts in his usual spot in front of the net. He then veers into the far corner as a potential outlet for Draisaitl. After Draisaitl makes the pass across to McDavid instead, the defender who was covering Hyman now pushes out to McDavid, who would otherwise be all alone. Hyman goes to the backdoor, but the defender does a good job to cut off the passing lane. Hyman gets covered by another Canucks defender, who stays there to block a potential cross-crease pass. As Draisaitl goes through the slot, Hyman pulls away from the net to the face off dot as a potential one-time option. After that no longer is an option and the Oilers are cycling on the other side of the ice, Hyman again floats down to the side of the net, where eventually Nugent-Hopkins passes the puck across to him for the goal.
The above demonstrates the power of player movement (as well as the fact that so many of the Oilers players can be dangerous from so many places). Not a single player ends the play in the same spot they started. Importantly, players who only get one touch in the entire sequence, i.e. Bouchard to start it and Hyman to end it, are still moving around in unison with the main puck carriers of Draisaitl, Nugent-Hopkins and McDavid.
Another thing to notice is that for the majority of the time there is no Oiler penetrating the box/diamond. Nugent-Hopkins and Draisaitl skate through and engage a bit, but then release as passing options. While normally that is not a recipe for success, as you are stuck playing on the perimeter, it has the effect of freezing the penalty killers.
You’ll notice that the Canucks stay in a tight formation with no switching. This has the effect of cutting off the cross seam passes the Oilers like so much. But it also gives the Oilers plenty of time and space. The Oilers essentially lull the Canucks defenders into a false sense of security by not threatening the middle during the 17 seconds in the zone. Again, it should be noted that the Nugent-Hopkins pass shouldn’t be getting through, but since the Oilers never tried a single cross ice pass up to that point (other than Draisaitl’s immediate one to start the sequence), it likely looked as though no pass would come through.
There are elements of set plays in there, of course, the cycling between Draisaitl, Nugent-Hopkins, and McDavid are something we have seen plenty of times. You can see it had been going on the Draisaitl example as well. But all the above plays are so different that the players have to decide based on what the PK is doing on which one will work best. A decision being made on the fly like that makes it hard for a PK to properly defend, as if they cheat towards one option that leaves another option wide open (see the Bouchard goal above).
What’s gone wrong this round?
In reviewing the power plays this round, the big thing I have noticed is that Dallas is getting to pucks first. The Oilers might be able to get a shot off or a good chance, but it ends up being one and done, with Dallas clearing any danger. With a goalie as good as Jake Oettinger, that’s not a terrible strategy to trust him to make the first save.
For example, the one and only power play in Game 1 resulted in four shots on goal, but the rebound on each one was recovered by Dallas and cleared:
The power play starts with a faceoff win, and after getting set up leads to a chance for Draisaitl’s patented sharp angle one-timer from the bottom of the right faceoff circle. The shot is stopped, however, and as three Oilers go into the corner to retrieve the rebound, Dallas instead picks it up and shoots it down the ice.
Later, McDavid flies into the zone and lets a shot go. However, the rebound is easily handled by Dallas, as no Oilers are within spitting distance of the net, and down the ice goes the puck once again.
To a certain extent, the Oilers appeared to be rushing on the power play to get that first shot, instead of setting up and taking their time.
The other issue is the Oilers are not moving enough, which is a tenet of their power play.
For example, look at this from the first power play in Game 2:
The Oilers have a bit of a broken breakout, but manage to maintain control and set up. However, the player movement is minimal; the only player who ends up being in a different spot by the time the shot goes off is McDavid. Without many options, and likely frustrated by the previous stops by Dallas on this PP, Bouchard fires a wrister off that ends up being easily blocked. Dallas then wins two puck battles to recover the puck and clears.
The first power play for Game 3 gets off to a rough start, as the Stars clear the zone multiple times. The Oilers finally get set up almost a minute into it, and results in an almost Draisaitl patented one-timer:
Unfortunately, the Oilers lose the faceoff and the Stars clear once again.
The Oilers manage to gain the zone again and win some puck battles to be able to set up. They get the Stars to open up a bit and the Oilers use the space to push, starting with a chance for Draisaitl in the slot. He has to pass back due to pressure, but Bouchard fakes the shot, giving McDavid some room to catch his pass and let off a shot. The Oilers recover the rebound initially, but the pressure from the Stars forces Draisaitl to pass it off too quick when there was no good option, and the Stars clear once more.
You started to see some of that player movement again, which opened up the Stars PKers and they started chasing.
The second powerplay of Game 3 was the best the PP has looked in this series so far.
After an initial chance and clear by Dallas, followed by Dallas ragging the puck off an intercepted breakout pass, the Oilers intercept a Dallas clear, leading to extended zone time:
While the initial shot goes wide and Draisaitl whiffs on the rebound, McDavid manages to intercept the clearing attempt. The Oilers have some jump and a nice back pass from behind the net almost leads to a McDavid goal.
Hyman initially collects the rebound, and then when it is poked away from him, Draisaitl gets it and settles things down. He plays catch with McDavid, and although the Stars get a stick on the pass, it deflects straight to Hyman who gets a good chance on goal.
McDavid recovers the rebound and while his first pass is blocked and his second is almost intercepted, Nugent-Hopkins manages to corral the puck and get it back to him. The chaos leads to Hyman all alone in front of the net, as two Dallas players are watching the Draisaitl cross seam with only Chris Tanev there, who has to both challenge McDavid while simultaneously blocking the pass attempt to Hyman. The pass gets through, but Hyman can’t immediately get a handle on it. He does manage to get a backhand shot off that Oettinger knocks aside.
McDavid is again first to the rebound, and although his pass is knocked down, Nugent-Hopkins is there to pick it up and slide back to Bouchard, who fakes everyone with the slap shot and slides the puck down to Draisaitl, who unfortunately whiffs on his shot.
How the Oilers can get back on track
The key through the Oilers goals on the power play above is player movement. For the Oilers 15 PPG so far in the playoffs, I counted two where there was minimal player movement, as it was essentially just McDavid who drastically changed positions, and one with almost none, but that’s just because Draisaitl scores from that impossible angle when Draisaitl wants to score from that angle.
The last power play in Game 3 was a good sign that the first unit was getting its mojo back.
Dallas is very aggressive on the PK, which I think took the Oilers by surprise initially, although Vancouver played them similarly at times. There is no room for error given Dallas’ ability to pounce on loose pucks. But as we saw in that last PP, if the Oilers can recover it, eventually Dallas’ aggressiveness goes against them, as they start to tire. However, as their system is predicated on being aggressive, they still push in spite of that. At 42 seconds of the above video, you can see that this aggressiveness is what leads to Draisaitl being open, as the Star at the point ends up behind Bouchard and the Star who is supposed to be on Draisaitl has to go to the middle to get in the way of Bouchard’s potential shot.
One of the virtues of the Oilers PP, in addition to player movement, is patience. I know it drives fans mad when they seem to be lallygagging around with no urgency, but it is a strategy that allows the Oilers to read the PK and determine which play would work best. The issue with doing it against Dallas is that they attack the puck carrier so strongly that there isn’t that time and space.
So the Oilers need to start their PPs/zone time with quick passes and puck movement. Player movement won’t work as well because the Stars pressure the puck carrier right off the bat and don’t back down right away. The easiest way to get them chasing is to move the puck around, after all the puck moves faster than the players.
This also means making simpler, safer passes. Use the Stars strategy against them. Although it might seem antithetical, the Oilers do not necessarily have to individually move a lot off the hop. Remember, they have a man advantage, which means there should always be someone open. If they spend the first bit just making the safest, shortest open pass, eventually Dallas is either going to start chasing and opening up gaps, or they will sit back and the Oilers can then dictate the play and pace.
If the Oilers can get the power play going, and not go over half a period without getting a shot on goal, then they can easily turn this series around. If those trends continue in a negative fashion, however, it might be the nail in the coffin for this team’s Stanley Cup dreams.
Photo by Curtis Comeau/Icon Sportswire
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